Paul Caro (1859-1914)

[Wheesht]

I have started working my way through a 1911 tome with mostly illustrated biographies of German composers and musicians, and there are lots of unknown (to me anyway) names. One of the most prolific composers listed is Paul Caro (born in Breslau [Wroclaw], 1859, died 1914), who had written 34 string quartets and 5 symphonies when the book was published. A quick search for digitised music has resulted in just one hit, from the University of Warsaw Library, a "Ländler-Cyclus für Pianoforte.

[eschiss1]

I may have asked about him also, after seeing references in various issues Hofmeisters Monatsberichte post-1900 to many chamber works of his including a string quartet in B-flat minor, etc. Although someone may have mentioned that they found his music pedestrian iirc, I still hope to find out for myself...

(a forum search suggests that wherever I asked, it wasn't -here-!)

[eschiss1]

William Newman mentions him at least once in The Sonata Since Beethoven: page 98 quoting a sarcastic review of one of Caro's cello sonatas (Op.42 in D minor, published ca.1910/11.) (I'm not sure who he's quoting - Google Preview doesn't seem to go that far?..., but I see a review in "Die Musik", 1910-11 Jg 10, Bd 40, p.189, available @ Archive.org, so I'm going to have a look.)

Yep, Newman's quote _is_ in fact of this very same review by Hugo Schlemüller in Die Musik ("Und der Komponist sprach: Sonaten, bei denen das Cello einen...")

[eschiss1]

btw, ÖNB has an opera by Caro in manuscript reduction, "Die Hochzeit zu Ulfosa : Oper in 2 Akten". Not currently digitized, but as with some other libraries, I think one can request it (does ÖNB and/or BSB charge for such things? Probably, understandably!...) Also a symphonic poem Auf hohem Berge, another Im Frühling, and a "Berg-Symphonie" (and 2 others - in C minor and D major). In fact these are part of a "Teilnachlass Paul Caro" that contains manuscripts of some of his chamber works too (string quintet in E minor, violin sonatas 2-5, 7 & 8, etc, other works) as well as other works in published form. Neat.

[Wheesht]

A 1900 review of some of his piano pieces in "Signale für die musikalische Welt" is not exactly laudatory, saying that once you have played a couple of them, you know them all, short-winded melodies repeated over and over again, some of them admittedly quite pretty. The fact that the composer has embraced keys such as C-sharp major, F-sharp major, G-flat major does not make his pieces more interesting, but certainly more challenging for those wishing to tackle them.

An earlier review (in the Neue Zeitung für Musik from October 1885) of Op. 2, the Sonata for Piano and Violin, is positively scathing, with the reviewer, Emanuel Klitzsch, wondering how one can have the audacity of calling something as immature and lacking ideas a sonata.

There are positive reviews, too, though, for example one of piano pieces in 1895 by one Keller in the Deutsche Kunst- und Musikzeitung.

How much of Caro's music has survived and where and if it's worth resurrecting is a question that may involve quite a lot of digging and sleuthing.   

[eschiss1]

the answer to the former question seems to be a fair amount (as noted?)